The Internet
Every month, new Internet cafes and points of access open up in Ecuador's larger towns and cities. In Quito, for instance, the competition has become so fierce that rates periodically drop to below $0.5 for an hour online. In light of the cost of international calls, email is one of the best ways to stay in touch with people overseas. You can get free email accounts from a number of different providers, Hotmail at www.hotmail.com and Yahoomail at www.yahoo.com being among the most popular. They only take a moment to set up and are accessible from any computer linked to the Net. Some of the better-equipped places offer a net phone service, which allows you to make international telephone calls via the internet at the price it takes to log on (domestic rates). The quality of the calls isn't yet as good as being on a proper phone - you'll probably have to shout out your conversation in a crowded Internet cafe, ending every sentence with "over" because of the sizeable delay - but it really is the cheapest way of calling home. At the moment, Ecuador's ISPs (Internet Service Providers) are only based in Quito, Guayaquil and Cuenca, and Internet cafes are less widespread outside these cities, as they have to pay regional or national phone rates to log on. In some cases the "cafes" (often a computer shop with one machine linked up) charge a cheap rate for the time spent writing emails off-line, and a more expensive call rate for the short time it takes online to send them (around $0.1-0.15 per minute). Having said that, the pace of change in this area is astounding, and the cost and availability of Internet access in Ecuador is likely to get better all the time. It's generally not worth bringing your own laptop for Internet access, unless you're going to rent your own place. Very few hotels allow direct dialling from rooms, making logging on impossible. Make sure you have a surge protector ( supresor de picos/regulador de corriente ) before you plug in to the power supply; without one your hard disk can be badly damaged . You can get them at home or in Quito for around $10 at Coresol, Carrion 514 and Reina Victoria.
Your Tip for Ecuador
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